Monday, October 29, 2012

Rippers: RPG Settings I Like

RIPPING YARNS
Last week in my survey of my favorite horror RPGs I’d read and those I wanted to read I
mentioned Rippers. By happy coincidence that game appeared as a freebie
for RPG Now’s Halloween Giveaway. I downloaded the pdf and read through it
pretty quickly.

There had been a few Victoriana Horror sourcebooks before Rippers- GURPS Screampunk,
Victorian
Age Vampire, Cthulhu by Gaslight,
Dracula,
and even Ravenloft’s Gothic Horror sub-setting Masque of Red
Death. Rippers came out at a time when Steampunk and Victoriana themes
and aesthetics had picked up speed in rpgs. It was also before the heat of the League
of Extraordinary Gentlemen had been tempered by the wet rag that was the
movie.

Rippers presents a world of pulp-gothic monster-hunters, under siege but
also armed with a variety of weird weapons and technology. They’ve come to be
called the Rippers because they use “Ripper-tech” organic implants and
extracts used to borrow powers and strengths from the monsters they fight. They
need those to even the odds against their more powerful foes, The Cabal. This
group, formed by a renegade member of the Rippers, is dedicated to organizing
dark forces and exterminating the monster hunters. It’s a world-spanning
concept, aiming at investigation and action. It has a dark-side too- with as
the use of Rippertech corrupts. In that way, it’s a little like Cyberpunk-
with a trade-off of humanity for power.

Rippers is a setting sourcebook for Savage Worlds- though an
earlier edition of that system. I assume converting it to the most recent
version wouldn’t be hard. I’ve read a couple of SW setting books before- Sundered Skies
and the original version of Necessary Evil.
As someone who usually adapts these concepts over to homebrew systems, I
appreciate the simplicity of SW. It gets out of the way pretty quickly and
offers few weird corner case systems. I can eyeball most conversions. It also
means that less of any particular book is given over to mechanics. There’s more
room for cool ideas.

PRESENTATIONRippers is a 146 page-pdf, with color interiors and backgrounds. The pdf
file comes with a printer-friendly version as well. Currently Rippers is
out of print and only available electronically. I’m a little surprised that
they haven’t done a “Reloaded” version, but perhaps sales weren’t strong
enough. The lines support by a Rippers Companion,
several adventures, and a GM screen. There’s also Rippers: the
Horror Wars, a miniatures game I missed- it may have come first. (I’ll
have to see if I can find any of those figures. The text design for Rippers
is pretty much classic mid-00’s Pinnacle; simple two-column layout, with plenty
of white space, and some odd font choices. The color texture background on the
pages can be obtrusive reading on a tablet- so you might want to use the
printer-friendly version. The art’s decent in most places, but nothing really
grabs me. The writing’s generally good- simple and straight to the point.
There’s some repetition, but the book aims for clarity. It offers an
alternative to dense, elaborate, and/or ‘sophisticated’ approaches to rules
writing. At times it feels a little dummied down, but never enough to annoy. It
avoids the cardinal sin of too much game fiction.

CHARACTERSRippers begins by offering some suggestions for archetypes. These are
just brief paragraphs ideas in case players might be stuck. There’s a certain
amount of that in this character- helping hands for people who might not know
the genre or might not know role-playing. More of the section is given over to
the mechanics, especially what makes these characters different from the usual
SW build. Rippers has a few new hindrances and many new edges related to
the setting. Characters can come from different factions within the Ripper
community (Rosicrucian, Masked Crusader, Slayers, etc). Each offers a unique
faction edge the player may take. There’s a decent section on possessions with
costs adapted to an abstract decimal pound system. Rippers has some fun and
wierd equipment.

The changes from standard SW comes with the new Reason Trait, Status, Lodges,
and the availability of Rippertech. Reason is a kind of sanity/stability score,
which can go negative. It modifies Spirit checks as well as rolls on the Fright
Table, which the book offers an expanded version of. Incidents and use of
Rippertech can negatively impact Reason. The Status system is simple- a value
which can be wagered to gain an advantage in social interactions. Doing
unseemly things can lower one’s status as well- and even among the fraternity of
the Rippers, status is all-important. There’s a well done and easy to manage
system for tracking Lodges for the Rippers. These are measured on Influence,
Resources, Membership, and Facilities. When PCs travel to new locales, they may
be faced with inadequate local support- or be able to call on better assistance
than back home. The rules include options for the party starting and developing
their own lodges. That’s a useful, simple, and adaptable set of rules for SW
and other games in general

The most alluring aspect for the players will be Rippertech- allowing the
players to emulate or borrow the powers of monsters. So they can gain Retinal
Grants, Talons, Gills or the like. These can be implants or extracts. The
former requires a test to see if they can be implanted successfully. Even a
successful implant can cause Reason loss, inflict damage, and curse the
character with side effects. Raises on skill rolls can mitigate that. Players
may press their luck- the rules make it easy to go overboard and have your
character lose it. Those wishing a less dangerous and less permanent benefit
can use extracts- with more modest risks (especially when compounding
benefits). Characters can also research new Rippertech, an interesting and
difficult process. At first it appears there aren’t that many options available
for the players- they may be disappointed. However the GM section contains many
other options, which they can dole out to the group later.

GAMEMASTERING
The first part of the GM’s section (30-58) lays out the world and how to run in
it. It begins by describing the real history behind the Ripper orders and the
threats facing it. The material's quick and broadly sketched. Likewise the
longer section following, describing all the sections of the world, only features
highlights. There’s an odd focus which the political figures in charge in each
nation- suggesting that the authors see that as a key detail. Countries get a
micro-political history, accompanied by some strange sites of interest. Most
have a tag which indicates an adventure seed in the last half of the book. The
world background’s lightly done and what’s there is a hodge-podge. GM’s
interested in the period will probably want to fleshing it out with rpg
sources- The Imperial
Age, The
Kereberos Club, Victoriana,
and even Castle
Falkenstein.

The GM section also has an decent discussion of period travel- and how to make
interludes between destinations interesting and colorful. Players rushing into
foreign Ripper Lodges may have to negotiate and become accepted, a nice detail
as well. The section includes many pages of new Rippertech and further
discussion of the challenges and perils of developing new forms. There’s even a
macabre section of Cabal-developed Rippertech, using the Rippers themselves as
a resource.

THE PLOTS
Finally the adventures and opposition section takes up the rest of the book
(59- 137). Fourteen pages cover a detailed and rich adventure generator system.
I really like this. I’ve seen these things done half-assed in other
books- just a couple of pages of tables. Rippers offers many options,
well-detailed, allowing the GM to craft distinct story types. It helps model
the kinds of tales and sessions this setting involves. That’s followed by 42
pages of Savage Tales- adventure seeds well sketched out, but with wiggle room
for the GM. Some of these are stronger than others. A few of them feel like
dummied-down versions of horrors and concepts from other games and stories. For
example, the Rippers' take on The King in Yellow is pretty
pedestrian. There’s also the desire to throw in every period reference and
detail they can. Still there’s enough here for the GM to run many, many
sessions of cool stories- many linked to the earlier geography section.

As with most Savage Worlds setting books, there’s also a “Plot Point”
campaign, linked Savage Tales which form a campaign backbone telling a sweeping
and complete tale of the Rippers. The book wraps up with many pages of enemies
and allies. Each has simple and clear details, stat blocks which don’t feel
like stat blocks. There’s a nice mix of general adversaries (werewolves,
ghosts) and unique named baddies. A few offer new ideas and takes on classic
monsters, but most stay pretty conventional.

OVERALL
I generally enjoyed this book- despite it feel a little simplistic. GMs who
have read other games covering the period or who know the history/literature of
it may be disappointed by the detail. Newer gamers may actually find one of the
more accessible approaches to Victoriana gaming- relying of basic tropes and
focusing on only a couple key details of the period (status and travel). But
more importantly, the key idea- of an ancient society of monster hunters
tempted by the lure of monstrous bio-tech is a great one. That’s a new spin
worth playing out. It works especially well for a fast, action-oriented, and
pulpy campaign. The dilemma of the Rippertech is clear and graspable by a
group. I can easily imagine adapting this to another light system. You could
also take that central concept and use it in a modern or other horror setting
(dungeon delvers who steal parts from monsters?). A clever GM moving the
timeline forward might make a connection between this Cabal and the one present
in GURPS Cabal.
A fun book and one worth tracking down.